U

The Incredible String Band

Prog Folk

From Progarchives.com, the ultimate progressive rock music website

A bit underestimated and relatively hard to find album. Musically it reaches the level of Hangman..., 5000 Spirits... or The Big Huge however doesn't contain hits as First Girl I Loved. Large instrumentarium and a number of guest musicians. Easily four star album.

Report this review (#174515)
Posted Friday, June 20, 2008 | Review Permalink

waluigithewalrus

This is a decent effort from The Incredible String Band, but not something that is necessary for a collection. The album certainly has it's moments; for instance, the opening instrumental track 'El Wood Suite', though repetitive, features a fantastic combo of sitar and flute, with each getting their own melody before coming together in the last section. The 'Partial Belated Overture' is also quite a fun song, featuring two electric guitars going simultaneously in the first part, before switching over to a more upbeat second part featuring the violin prominently. Also among the bright points is 'Invocation', a song that deeply displays the band's Celtic influence with a song that is pretty much an Invocation to the Pagan Gods.

Despite this, there is still something wanting with this album. Many songs are unexciting and far from progressive. 'Bad Sadie Lee' is basically a sing-a-long song about a sort of female version of Billy the Kid. The 10 minute 'Light In Time Of Darkness/Glad To See You' is almost entirely a vocals and piano piece that plods along with no dynamic, tempo, or meter change until it reaches the 'Glad To See You' part of the song, which only last for about two minutes. The track immediately following it 'Walking Along With You' seems to take forever, as there seems to be little emotion in the piece. Perhaps strangest of all is 'Robot Blues' which is exactly what it sounds like; a piano blues piece written about whatever robots get sad about.

Overall, the album has a few worthwhile elements, but is not something that's worth listening to all that often due to only having some progressive elements to it.

Report this review (#1218595)
Posted Sunday, July 20, 2014 | Review Permalink

THE INCREDIBLE STRING BAND U ratings only

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Pintos (Sasha)
yair010390 (Eduardo Yair Robles Jim�nez)
gegece (gustavo garate de Nacional)
akaBona
SayYes
brig64 (Igor)
Ravenous (Chris Raven)
SpikeApostle (Michael Thompson)
pesciliere
sauromat (alexander)
caution
katebush (nastya)
Passka (Čengele Mengele)
PROGNATURE BEAST (AGAMEMNON)
ProckROGue (Chris)
APartOfTheUniverse (Matthew)
HarryAngel746 (Maciej) COLLABORATOR Honorary Collaborator
statice-pro (Daniel)
Spaciousmind (Nick)
Jammo58 (Jarmo Pystynen)
bureau (tpw)
PintosMob (Sasha)
JJ (Jorma J)
werther (frederic scheid)
HakkiBluoyd (Hakki Bluoyd)

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